So, are we pretty much in agreement that whenever the inevitable Donald Trump movie is greenlit, it will be helmed by Armando Iannucci? Because if The Death of Stalin is of any indication, he might be the only one to fully dramatize both the absurd hilarity of it all when you see it from a distance, as well the visceral horror when you actually look at the agenda that he, and his accomplices want to put in place.
But then again, he might not even have to. After all, it wouldn’t take a rocket scientist to see some parallels between what’s happening now in the United States, and the period the film explores where chaos ensues due to the power vacuum left in the Soviet regime after the passing of Josef Stalin (played rather briefly by Adrian McLoughlin). It’s not so much a one-to-one comparison, though an argument can be made for a couple characters, but it’s something you can’t help but feel as you’re watching the events unfold.
Iannucci and his co-writers, David Schneider, Ian Martin, and Peter Fellows, do an astounding tonal tightrope walk here. Doing a dark comedy is incredibly hard to pull off, and it becomes increasingly so when you deal with very real events that have affected many lives. How do you keep an audience laughing at the comedy beats while maintaining a tense atmosphere with legitimate stakes involving deaths of countless people depending on who is trying to grab power at any given moment while never crossing the line into pure tastelessness? Well, whatever the answer may be, it seems like Iannucci has figured it out. The film effortlessly transitions between moments of brutality and moments of absurdism, all while only ever making the switches jarring or abrupt when absolutely necessary in order to get the point across. It’s very calculated and precise when you look very carefully at what the filmmakers and the cast are doing, but it otherwise feels so loose and casual, cleverly lulling you into a state of amusement before throwing some seriously dark material at you.
Aside from Iannucci’s abilities as a writer, his biggest gift is being able to get the absolute best out of his actors, which for anyone familiar with his work on The Thick Of It, Veep, and In The Loop, comes to no surprise. With the likes of Steve Buscemi, Simon Russell Beale, Michael Palin, Jeffrey Tambor, Paddy Considine, Andrea Riseborough, and many more, with no one being a stranger to comedy, everyone is able to elevate material that was already good to begin with. And the way each performer is able to go from farcical to tragic is truly a sight to behold. Michael Palin and Simon Russell Beale are especially spectacular in the film when it comes to this complex dynamic that the script requires, but everyone gets plenty of opportunities to throw in some seriously killer line deliveries.
As with most dark comedies, the audience will be a niche one, and that is especially true for The Death of Stalin because the highest moments of humor are matched with the lowest of lows in its portrayal of terrifying truths about the nature of power, politics, and fascism. The film is more than willing to get mean and nasty in ways Iannucci hasn’t been before. Whereas his brilliant 2009 film, In The Loop, keeps the terrible consequences of everyone’s actions very distant and offscreen, The Death of Stalin will show innocent people being rounded up and shot, and that’s nothing compared to some of the even more uglier implications that pop up as the film goes along. If this sounds interesting to you, then I absolutely encourage you to seek it out. It’s a very challenging film, a very bleak film, but it’s one that also has a lot to say. It will have you laughing so hard that you gasp for air, only to find yourself quietly and somberly walking to the car as your brain dwells in some of the cruelty you witnessed, realizing things aren’t that different nowadays, but then you’ll remember a gag, and you’ll giggle to yourself while you start the car and drive home. That feat is nothing short of impressive.